This invention relates to air-water syringes, and more particularly to syringe tips for dental syringes.
Air-water syringes are used by dentists and dental technicians for many dental procedures, such as cleaning debris from a patient's teeth and mouth. The teeth and mouth are cleaned by the spraying of a stream of water or a stream of air from the syringe. A typical air-water syringe has a hand-piece and a syringe tip releasably attached to the hand-piece.
Many dentists use disposable (single use only) syringe tips to avoid spreading infectious diseases from one patient to another. A typical disposable air-water syringe tip has inner and outer coaxial tubes which define discrete air and water passageways. The water passageway is defined by the inner surface of the inner tube. The air passageway is defined by the outer surface of the inner tube and the inner surface of the outer tube. Water is directed from a water passageway in the hand-piece to the patient via the water passageway in the tip. Air is directed from an air passageway in the hand-piece to the patient via the air passageway in the tip.
A disadvantage of such syringe tips is the cost to manufacture. These disposable syringe tips are viewed as too expensive by many dentists since a tip is to be discarded after a single use. These dentists find it more cost effective to purchase autoclavable (i.e., reusable) syringe tips. An autoclavable syringe tip is generally much more expensive than a disposable syringe tip, but may be used repeatedly if it is sterilized between uses.
During a dental procedure it may be desirable to have the patient rinse with a mouthwash or other type of solution. Dispensing the rinse in a manner separate from the air-water syringe can be inconvenient and time consuming.
An attempt to simplify delivery of a rinse as described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,593,423, is to attach the air-water syringe to a source of the rinse and selectively spray it into a patient's mouth. Drawbacks to this approach are the need for special air-water syringes, the inability to easily select from various different types of rinses and the need to periodically fill the rinse cortainer.